St. Just-in-the-Willows

[Tonquani]

So this has very much been an experiment for me. My line drawing has always been the weakest part of my mapping, so I decided to focus on that and get it right before looking at anything else.

The ancient fishing village of St' Just-in-the-Willows is a small fairly remote fishing village with a thriving trade in all kinds of goods. The are plentiful resources nearby (forests, possibly a couple of productive mines), good fertile land, and the bountiful sea.

St Just.jpg

I'm not convinced that this is entirely finished yet, but is close enough for now.

Any comments and criticisms are more than welcome. Please let me know if you think I am doing something wrong, or can improve.

[Lupulus]

Very nice, I really like the way you did the trees and the light brown lines edging the paths, which help give them a little more definition.

One problem I am having is with the lines on the cliffs: my brain keeps inverting them like an optical illusion, as if the farms are sunken down below the surrounding land rather than up above. Only on the bottom portion of land though, the cliffs near the village look fine. I don't know if the lines are too close together or if a different pattern to show depth would help.

[Larb]

I think it would really benefit from shading the base colour of your roofs darker on the shadowed side. But I think it looks great.

[Tonquani]

Very nice, I really like the way you did the trees and the light brown lines edging the paths, which help give them a little more definition.

One problem I am having is with the lines on the cliffs: my brain keeps inverting them like an optical illusion, as if the farms are sunken down below the surrounding land rather than up above. Only on the bottom portion of land though, the cliffs near the village look fine. I don't know if the lines are too close together or if a different pattern to show depth would help.

Thanks Lupulus, I will have look at that. One thing I was thinking of doin which may help is to make the shadows a lot longer. I’ll just have to see how that works out.

I think it would really benefit from shading the base colour of your roofs darker on the shadowed side. But I think it looks great.

Thanks Larb, I’ll give it a go!

[Tonquani]

Righto, changes made as suggested by Larb and Lupulus.

I still feel that the shading isn't quite right, just a bit rough around the edges (metaphorically speaking), and the coastal cliffs still don't make sense to me. I think I am almost trying to show both slope aspect shadowss and cast shadows on the cliffs, but not really anywhere else.

Anyone know of any really good tutorials that detail how to shade these type of maps?

St Just.jpg

[MistyBeee]

Great map, Tonquani !
I already saw your thread yesterday and thus it was not obvious for me to see a problem with the cliffs, I was able to convince my brain to invert the elevation, which is much harder today, and the light is really better in my opinion. Congrats for the good work !